Censorship in Europe is an increasing threat against basic human rights and eventually against rule of law.
In October, Swedish Radio reported (in Swedish) about a proposal from the Danish government. The security police would be allowed to:
- Trace and remove propaganda by entering servers and delete material
- Force Internet providers to block domains abroad which contain propaganda
They also reported about the proposed “common sense voices”, a task force to provide countermeasures when radical messages are spread in social media.
Already in 2011, Rick Falkvinge highlighted the risk of opening the door for censorship, even it it is for a good cause. It now appears that he has been proven right.
In Germany, the paper Deutsche Wirtschafts Nachrichten (DWN) seems to be threatened with censorship. Read their call for help (in German). Interestingly, they have published articles such as the following, which are critical of the West:
- Wer in Syrien wirklich kämpft: Die schwarze Liste der Schande des Westens (in German) / Who actually fights in Syria: the black list of the Empire’s shame (translation to English).
- Frühere US-Geheimdienstler warnen Merkel vor Säbelrasseln gegen Russland (in German)
Obviously, state criminals in the West don’t want the public to know about their crimes, and will do anything to stop such information from getting attention. If it is not enough to label critical voices as “conspiracy theorists” or “Putin lovers”, censorship seems to be a possible method.